


Cosmic Love

by TheEndofEternity



Series: Eternity-Verse [2]
Category: Foundation - Isaac Asimov, Robot Series - Isaac Asimov
Genre: AU, Elijah: I lived bitch, Gay, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-07 06:24:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15213110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheEndofEternity/pseuds/TheEndofEternity
Summary: A series of one-shots centered around the possibility of an established relationship between Elijah and Daneel that could only ever exist in my AU dreams





	1. Empathy

**Author's Note:**

> I promise I have a backstory for this AU coming... like it's not entirely nonsense I promise !
> 
> But for now enjoy the fluff >:D
> 
> Note: the characters and backstories belong to the Asimov estate and not me.

It had been a long day for both of them. Elijah had just settled into a new position as a data analyst at some small company (which had actually been founded by one of Daneel’s own personal confidantes, an exclusive position). As for Daneel, by all appearances he had a fairly simplistic, nonconsequential job working as an archival clerk at a local university. However inconspicuous this seemed, it was in covert positions such as these that he was capable of controlling the flow and continuation of select information throughout the galaxy.. Despite the high implications, it was a position that he enjoyed, and one which allowed to maintain a relatively low profile. Plus it saved him the trouble of crafting an elaborate persona built around his work. Both he and Elijah were tired of lying. They would never get used to the lying. 

Additionally, and although Elijah wouldn’t personally ask him if this were the case (as if he ever needed to), he suspected that it was an added bonus in his position that Daneel was hopelessly nostalgic. Which meant that there were days that he would bring home various bookfilms, holotexts, lectures, and other relics that reminded him of times or places he’d been, each being so seamlessly connected in the unfailing webs of his memory. 

Elijah was already lying on the couch of their modest apartment scrolling mindlessly through a bookfilm when Daneel came in. If he had noticed the stacks of holosheets and films clutched in his arms, he would have quickly come over to help him carry some of them in, but as usual with Daneel, he gracefully sat the stack down on a small side table and turned to close the door. 

He walked over to the couch, Elijah putting his bookfilm down and greeting him with a smile, and in return leaned over the edge for a kiss. 

Still leaning in, he gave a characteristic, small smile. “Elijah.”

Elijah pecked him on the nose. “Good day?”

Daneel nodded. “Yes. I brought home quite a few new bookfilms– “new” being in the sense that neither of us have viewed them rather than relating to age, of course– I thought that if you weren’t busy tonight you might enjoy some of them?”

“When–I mean, what time period are they from?”

Daneel grabbed two of the films from the table. “I’m afraid I cannot give you a single answer. To my knowledge, and this is only according to the research I was able to complete within a single afternoon, two are films loosely attributed to the horror drama dating to between 3820 and 3264 of the common era, each film’s overarching motif stemming from the works of Sofia Nova. Who I know you’re quite fond of.”

Elijah nodded. “Mmmm. I am. The others?”

“Just some things that interested me personally. Which I would be happy to share with you, of course, although I’m not entirely sure that would you be similarly interested.”

“Perhaps not. But I think I’d enjoy anything if I was watching it with you.”

Daneel gave Elijah a blank look at he settled into the seat next to him on the couch. “I will go ahead and tell you what you occasionally tell me. That was not a good one.”

Elijah snorted as he put his arm around his husband’s waist. “Good point. But I was hoping I could steal you for the afternoon to begin with. So, your choice?”

“I believe I’d enjoy either of the works I brought inspired by Nova, so we can start with either of those, although…” Daneel paused, as if deep in thought.

Just as soon as he hesitated, he regained his composure. “I think we should watch them. I’ll put the first film in.”

——————-

He had adjusted the viewer and they’d begun to watch the film. Elijah bored quickly of it, tiring quickly from staring at a screen with such muted colors and little sound. He absently played with Daneel’s hair; Daneel, who, contrary to Elijah, seemed intensely focused on the film (although he focused intensely on most things). Despite this, he had fallen further into his husband’s embrace, which made Elijah well with joy. Not only due to the simple sweetness of the gesture and their closeness, but the ease with which Daneel was now able to accept comfort. This had been something Elijah worked desperately to fix upon his return.

He whispered into his husband’s ear. “Are you enjoying the film?”

Daneel nodded. “I am. In fact, this particular scene remi-,” his train of thought was interrupted with the sound of successive explosions, followed by the splash of blood, human blood, across the ground, nearly black and white in the film’s dark cinematography. Blood, guts, fear, and death. 

And Daneel was subjected to seeing all of it. 

He was unable to complete his sentence. Elijah swooped over to the viewer to turn it off, swearing, and still holding Daneel in a half-embrace, then went straight back to his husband, now shaking and speechless. 

“Daneel? Daneel, hey,” he rubbed a hand over his cheek, “None of that was real. It was a set and actors and paint, nobody was hurt, okay?”

Daneel leaned into his touch and nodded. Elijah pulled him in for a hug. He wanted him to stop shaking, to talk to him with his usual intensity and grace and that amazing smile. He could tell his husband was in pain–physically and mentally. 

The most powerful person in the galaxy, reduced to fragility, strangled by his own empathy. 

He was too good for the galaxy. He was too good for him. But Elijah knew that he had to be the one to protect him. It was the least he could do. 

He held his head with one hand and rubbed his back with the other. “It’s okay, everything is okay.” 

Daneel slowly moved himself up to look Elijah in the eyes. He was still shaking, a bit less.

“Elijah, I…,” he looked down, “I-I’m okay. I’ll be okay.”

“I shouldn’t have subjected you to that. I should have known, with the direction it was heading,” he gently moved a hand to Daneel’s chin and brought his eyes back to his, “the damned film…Daneel, you…. you deserve better. You don’t deserve to go through this.” 

“I have to get used to it, Elijah.”

“No, you don’t, damn it,” Elijah shook his head, “That was disgusting nonsense violence. You didn’t have to see that. You should never have to see that.”

“But it does happen.”

“No!” Elijah clasped Daneel’s hands in his, “Not here and not now.” He looked intently into those amazing blue eyes, so commonly steady but right now pulsing with anxiety. 

“I’m right here, Daneel. Everything is fine.”

Finally, Daneel smiled slightly, calming down but holding Eiijah’s hands even tighter now. “I know, Elijah.”

——————————-

They lied together in the dark, holoviewer long turned off, for almost an hour more. Daneel rested his head on Elijah’s chest so he could feel the steady beating of his heart, a stabilizing gesture, one that reminded him that the man he loved was with him, and that he was well. 

Elijah pushed his hair behind his ears with tender focus, paying special attention to the microexpressions on his husband’s face to be sure that they were conveying comfort. He had since calmed down after viewing the film– not a difficult task when Elijah was present– but Elijah agonized internally nonetheless. 

Hopelessly, however, he knew that Daneel, with his capabilities of mental sensation, could feel that he was still distraught. Although, thank goodness for both of them, the specific contents of his thoughts remained obscured. Because despite Elijah’s greatest wishes, for Daneel to have a beautiful life and to feel strongly about himself and his achievements and to see himself as an equal, he would never be liberated from the laws. And such a conversation with Daneel about them could be just as distressing as the scene he just witnessed on holovision, if not worse. 

So he would never bring it up to him. Which, Elijah thought, was fine. But he had to know that Daneel was okay, that he was happy. 

His eyes were closed right now, not due to sleep, but rather, to regain mental equilibrium. The combination of Elijah’s care and a carefully executed procedure of rest allowed him to quickly abate any positronic distress. 

————————

Later in the evening, Elijah found Daneel working in his small balcony garden, as serene and calm as he had been when he first came home. 

He turned from his task of tending to a small herbaceous terrarium, sensing Elijah as he came through the door. 

“I’m testing a cross-fertilization of a non-native marigold with fennel in a test to alleviate crop-wide attrition on a small scale,” he turned briefly to smile at Elijah, “It’s quite the small-scale pilot study, but I have yet to obtain clearance to conduct any experiments at the horticulture center.”

“I’m surprised they haven’t. I can’t imagine anyone saying no to you.”

Daneel looked at him quizzically. “I can think of plenty of reasons why someone would say no to me. However, in this case, it is simply a matter of funding.”

“Well, of course,” he wrapped a single arm around his husband and sat his head on his shoulder, “I just think you deserve the world. The whole galaxy. The universe.”

Daneel shrugged, setting down his pipette. “Perhaps.” 

Elijah chuckled and leaned in for a kiss, which Daneel reciprocated. “It’s true. It really is, and you can’t even argue with me about it.”

He stared at him, equally enamored with his husband’s brown eyes and messy brown hair flecked with grey (”Jehosaphat, of course my hair’s still grey,” is what Elijah had complained over once he and Daneel had the chance to sit down and actually discuss his return to life, even before they had established a romantic relationship. Daneel had explained to Elijah that he enjoyed it, and that it was one of the many characteristics about Elijah that he loved, so Elijah never touched his hair color again). 

“I won’t.”

They both sat in comfortable silence, wrapped together in a half embrace.


	2. Transitory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was moments like these that made everything worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Idek what this is lol

The sun shone in through the blinds, no longer a source of fear, but instead of simple irritation. Elijah squeezed his eyes shut even tighter, staring into the reds of his eyelids and trying to ignore the oncoming sunrise signalling the day’s beginning.

Two knocks, just like every morning. It seemed unnecessary; they slept together, got dressed together, occasionally showered together, and after the nights that Daneel would rest with Elijah in bed, although not sleeping, would wake up in the same room together. But Daneel was unrelentingly polite.

Elijah sat up in bed, trying to make himself look a bit more awake. “Come in.”

He stood at the door, comfortably dressed. And absolutely glowing, Elijah observed, although he looked that way every morning. But especially when the creeping sunlight hit the bronze of his hair at just the right angle. 

Daneel walked in, holding a mug of coffee and wearing a sweater he was absolutely swimming in. One of mine, Elijah noticed. Absolutely adorable. 

He came to sit next to Elijah on the bed, Elijah still shirtless and partially under the covers.

“Did you sleep well?” 

Elijah nodded, creeping his arm around his husband’s waist. 

“Yeah, yeah… wasn’t looking forward to today, though.”

Daneel smiled apologetically, “Perhaps the coffee might help? I would have stayed with you if I did not have preparatory work to conduct overnight.”

“I missed you,” Elijah gave a fake pout. 

Daneel frowned. “It had to be done Elijah,” he lowered a hand to hold Elijah’s, now situated around his mug of coffee, “but I do not think that today has to be as stressful as you have predicted it to be. There is no rush.”

“Still had to wake up early.”

Another small smile. “True… I prepared breakfast. I would like it if we could sit outside. I will miss the nature.”

They quickly kissed and Daneel waited while Elijah threw on a comfortable shirt and they headed out towards their balcony. They were to depart from their rural apartment that night in two fully-formed new identities working as intergalactic traders on a busy starship. They were to have their own quarters, but nowhere near as much privacy as they’d been used to for the past twenty years. 

Sitting on the balcony, they overlooked a small creek, which flowed into a river, which flowed into a lake, which eventually poured into the ocean. Everything fell into the broad expanse, just as they were about to. Daneel drank strongly herbal lemon tea (he enjoyed the intensity of the scent, as well as the warmth), while Elijah joyfully ate a slice of freshly baked bread topped with a preserve made out of some crossed-fruit Daneel knew more about than Elijah did. 

They discussed things that were not related to leaving, or moving, or deep space.They pretended that their names were no longer pretend, that they were Elijah Baley and Daneel Olivaw, everywhere and anywhere, forever and ever. 

Long lives brought unique challenges. 

Daneel’s hair was a bit tousled in a way that looked on-purpose, and darker than its usual shade. He also wore a pair of lightly colored frames (an accent, since glasses hadn’t served an actual function for thousands of years). Elijah was unscathed so far– they’d be dyeing his hair and cleaning up his facial hair after breakfast, but Elijah supposed that Daneel just wanted to look at him being close to his usual self for a little while longer. 

Daneel told him it didn’t matter and that it didn’t make a difference. Elijah believed him. But he was still so insecure. Old habits do die hard. 

Elijah liked the way that Daneel’s eyes told stories. He did not possess his husband’s capacity for sensing emotions or heightened empathy, but he could read Daneel so well after all these years just looking into those eyes. And it was in those eyes now that he saw a cover of calm but a shimmer of reluctance as well. A yearning for comfort in a man who so often refused his own comfort. 

Elijah took a sip of his coffee and, just as he did, Daneel sipped his tea, in tandem, like so much of what they do together. They really were a perfect team. Partners. There was no better word. 

Daneel told him about the negotiations he had to sit through last night, interjecting as a mediator under a persona with a name but not a story, just another side job he held overnight. There was conflict at the other end of the galaxy and distance made no difference to how much it mattered to him. 

They would soon be travelling from one edge to another and back. Traders. At least two years, spending most of their time on a spaceship. They enjoyed their privacy, but they would have to deal without it for awhile. They had plenty of years to spare. 

A bird landed on the balcony’s edge, Daneel quickly identifying. Elijah smiled. The day can wait.


	3. Singularity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Idle time leads to long discussions, and long discussions can lead to vulnerability. Fortunately, both had found someone who they could be completely vulnerable with.

Elijah let out a satisfied sigh after finishing his dinner, dutifully prepared by his husband after they both returned home and laid out before him in their garden on a blanket. After six days of working, it was good to simply enjoy each other’s company, alone, indulging in their own lives for once. 

He was sitting cross-legged with Daneel’s head in his lap. They watched the sunset together, Elijah’s hand stroking the burnt-bronze hair of his partner.

The dusk allowed a creeping bit of sunset to fall over them. He’d never get tired of the way his husband’s hair glinted in the sun, at dawn or dusk, the way his long eyelashes fluttered down when Elijah threaded his fingers throughout that hair, setting his positronic matrix into simulated bliss. Or non-simulated. It didn’t matter. It was all too real for him. 

Elijah still had many questions concerning the nature of his husband’s mind. How was it that two Auroran-Spacer engineers designed such a masterpiece, yet certainly no mere simulacrum? A mind that wove it’s way through endless original pathways, had suffered pain and suffering at the hands of human beings who doubted its existence yet still dedicated it’s life to them? A being without a soul, yet the warmest soul Elijah had ever known, and he believed, would ever know.

The questions would persist, but Elijah had decided long ago that he didn’t need an answer to them.

Daneel had been in the middle of telling a story about work when he paused, seeming to notice a shift in the texture of Elijah’s mind.

He sat up, placing a steady hand on Elijah’s shoulder. “Is everything all right? You were just previously in a relaxed state which had persisted since we left work.”

Elijah moved his hand to the one on his shoulder and rubbed it reassuringly. “I’m all right. Just a bit caught up in my own mind.”

“I understand. I have experienced this as well. I find it especially difficult to redirect my thoughts after a long duration of mental work.”

Smiling, he looked towards the remainder of their (or Elijah’s) meal. “I can usually divert my focus by undertaking a task that I enjoy. Which is why I wanted to prepare this dinner. Although some remnants can persists. Perhaps I should not have brought work into our conversation…”

Elijah shook his head. “No, no, you’re fine. I’m just a little jaded. Work can do that for me. But I’m glad we get to spend the next week together.”

“As am I,” Daneel said, leaning in for a kiss. They took more than a moment before breaking apart again. “No work. Let’s talk about different topics more engaging than either work or politics.”

Elijah grunted. “Shouldn’t be too difficult.”

Daneel smiled.

———————–  
The next day, they were lying on the couch, holoviewer off, and had lapsed into a comfortable silence, Elijah spread out comfortably across the couch and Daneel resting within his arms.

Elijah moved his fingers up and down Daneel’s back, up towards his neck where Elijah knows him to be the most sensitive. However, this time he did not receive the response he anticipated. It was Daneel this time who was distracted.

“You’re not doing any work up there,” he poked him gently in the head, “are you?”

Daneel smiled. “No, Elijah. And I am perfectly content at the moment. There are no immediate threats th-”

Elijah gave him a look. “Daneel…”

“And certainly… if there were, I would attend to them, but very rarely are they of an urgency that would necessitate immediate interruption.”

“Mmmhmm. Checks and balances. You have plenty of people working for you, or on your side, that you are allowed to rest easy sometimes. Like now. I can tell you’re stressed out over something.”

Daneel nodded, a bit reluctantly, but still sunk even further into his husband’s embrace. “I suppose I’m just caught up in my own head, as you put it.”

A dry chuckle. “Hey… relax. Do you want to do something more stimulating, maybe go for a walk or something? You’ve– we’ve had a long week.” He ran a hand through his husband’s hair slowly. “We’ve both been so occupied I haven’t even been able to do this. ”

The robot smiled, shifting to kiss his husband on the cheek. “I’m alright, Elijah, I…I do find myself thinking of you often when I work on a case. Not only to reflect on your physical characteristics, which I admire,” he looked over his husband in adoration, “but also to inspire intuitive thought processes, which come so easily to you and which I feel I will never fully emulate. But I do get to enjoy them.”

Elijah grunted. “Gonna have to disagree with you there. You have a wonderful intuition. No need to idolize me,” he let out a dry chuckle, “I mean, any part of me, really. I appreciate it, but I’m not exactly agile or graceful. Not like you.”

His husband paused for thought. “I do not think that is a fair assessment to make. I do not think of myself as being intuitive. I simply lack the capacity for broad intuitive strokes.”

“Doesn’t your brain improve and engage with experiences? Why should that not apply to intuition?”

Daneel gave a sad smile. “I believe you’ve forgotten that even with any capacity for neuroplasticity, there are inherent limitations with which I must work.”

“Well, let’s consider that to be the case. I won’t argue against it,” Elijah moved his hand over Daneel’s and gripped it tight, “but why should that mean that the intuition you have achieved is of lesser value? It’s different. It’s you.”

Daneel nodded. “I can see your line of reasoning. I am not completely absent of the capacity for intuitive or creative thought,” he let out a sigh, “Still, I do not forget my limitations.”

“It’s something we all have, Daneel. I’ll never be young again, I lack endurance, my body still looks half decayed despite improving my health. How can I dwell on all the things that make me feel inadequate when I have all of this?” He gestured a hand expressively through the air. 

Daneel frowned, releasing his hand from his husband’s grip and repositioning it over his chest. “Now I have to be the one to disagree. I don’t find you to be "decayed”, as you put it, in any sense. You are a human being, and it is only natural for you to possess characteristics such as these,“ he leaned in to give Elijah a kiss, "and I do not think that I need to tell you how much I enjoy every single one.”

“Okay, but not everyone thinks the way you do. I gotta work back through a lot of stuff. The world can make you hate yourself.”

The robot nodded, his eyes turned down. “It is unfortunate. I have always seen human individuality to be a strength, especially after living on a planet that rejected it and witnessing their inevitable downfall. And I will not soon forget that I am a product of that planet.”

“Hmm. You were activated on Earth, in Spacetown, right?”

Daneel nodded. “And my creators were more or less renegades in their own right to the convictions of the other Spacers. It was in the image of one of those renegades that I was created. Almost to the exact detail.”

He became quiet after this.

“Yeah, I remember being convinced that you were human because of the similarity. I didn’t have a chance to look at you enough then. And I wanted to, if you can believe it.”

Daneel gave a thin smile. “Yes, you were quite strong in your convictions. I’m sure you've noticed greater dissimilarities now that you’ve has the chance. It becomes increasingly clear upon observation that I am just an imitation.”

Elijah shifted uncomfortably. “I’ve never thought that, Daneel.”

“But it is the truth. My form is more simplistic, possessing perfect symmetry. There was not much thought put into individuality and it was even stated by other roboticists that it was a mistake to build a robot this way. It is flaws and minor imperfections that define one’s humanity. My appearance, at the time, was simply a copy, because the concept of having personal identity was never a necessary thought.”

“It was not that I desired to be human, or anything other than what I am. However, in my study and subsequent admiration of humanity, and my knowledge of robots increased, I began to feel something strange. The best way that I can describe this feeling, perhaps, is that I should not exist at all. That I fell through the proverbial cracks.”

He stated these things with even tones, as if he were instructing a class on the operation of an instrument. To him, these were just facts.

Elijah couldn’t disagree with him more.

“Daneel?”

The robot looked up at his husband with a placid expression, although years of being his partner and husband combined had taught Elijah to look more closely to reveal what he was really thinking. His eyes, for instance, shifted downwards, and Elijah noticed a slight flickering of his eyelids.

“Yes, Elijah?”

Elijah’s forehead creased with tension. “You really feel that way about yourself?” Of course he did, Elijah thought. Why would he ever have a reason to lie?

A steady nod.

Elijah couldn’t understand. Before him was the man, the robot, who he had fallen in love with so easily despite his past prejudices because how could he not? And while he had to admit that he really did epitomize physical perfection, a characteristic any human would envy but which further differentiates Daneel in a way he finds uncomfortable, it is not only that detail that has drawn him to Elijah. Not even in the slightest. 

And he wanted him to know this now, so desperately. He knew that these details were things that Daneel had dwelled on, by himself, for hundreds of years before Elijah reentered the picture. And he knew that Daneel would keep working despite the fact.

But he also knew that Daneel was not one to express his emotional weaknesses plainly (or many other emotions, for that matter). It is only by their extended time together that he has begun to more freely smile, to ask for affection, to even laugh in his own subtle way).

They both sat up from their embrace, Elijah keeping an arm around the robot and rubbing his back. “Daneel… you could be a damn carbon copy of Dr. Sarton and it wouldn’t change anything. Sure, I find you beautiful and alluring. But for so much more. There’s so much more, Daneel.”

“I’ve seen your eyes as every color in the rainbow. Of course, that's an exaggeration, but the point is, no matter what color your eyes are, I still see your happiness in them. I see your sadness. I see pain. It’s just you. I see you.”

Elijah took a deep breath, staring into those eyes.

“I’ve traced my fingers over every single freckle across your body. I don’t know what Sarton’s freckles looked like, and I’ll be damned if I care. They’re yours. They’re you. And even with my feeble old memory, I’ve memorized the spot of every single one. And if it takes kissing each and every one with words of affirmation to make you believe in your worth, then that’s what I’ll do.”

Daneel continued staring at his husband, needing to process everything that was just said to him. After a couple minutes, he threw his arms around his husband.

“Thank you, Elijah.”

Arms still around him, Elijah whispered in his ear. “You deserve to know how much you’re loved.”

A pink blush spread across Daneel’s face. “I presume you’re going to show me?”

Elijah nuzzled his head into his neck. His voice was muffled when he spoke next. “In every way I can.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I gave daneel an existential crisis :(


End file.
